Saturday, April 21, 2012

Random Acts

I find it funny that Misha Collins’ charity is called The Random Act, because wherever he is, random acts occur.

Take this uh, touching moment at NashCon where he was getting “Essence of Sebastian” on an AMOK t-shirt before giving it away.

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Sometimes I forget what community is - not the online stuff you can walk away from without a second glance - it’s almost family like. Screw that, it IS family.

Hanging out with L, and my little brother Jeff, drove home the joys of family. Even though Jeff isn’t my biological little brother, I love him like one and he’s one of the few people I can easily say I’d take a bullet for. I don’t “do” kids. I don’t like them. Generally don’t want anything to do with them. It’s very rare that I’ll even tolerate being in the same general vicinity. I don’t have that, that, THING that makes women’s ovaries explode when faced with babies.

Chilling with L, and hearing Jeff keep saying the word “family”, was eye opening. We don’t often get to pick our families… and even when we do, sometimes people can become a part of your family without prior approval. That’s not quite how I meant it, but you get the gist. L and I had a nice long stare off where neither of us were sure what to make of the other. We finally mutually decided the other was harmless and got along pretty well for the rest of my visit.

I think he knew when I was ready to go - he made a point of trying to untie my sneakers, then he handed me my keys, phone, and iPod before being told to kiss me on the cheek. Repeatedly. Because they had to get a picture of this. Seriously. I’m amazed I didn’t need a cootie shot, he kissed me so many times.

After getting home, I had to deal with the harsh reality of life and the cruelty and bravery that it has to offer. I didn’t know Chief Michael Maloney. I know friends of friends of the Chief, but my social distance from the man didn’t keep me from deeply grieving his death. The Chief was eight days from retirement when he was fatally shot in the head… after dragging his fellow officers to safety.

My entire commute to work has been nothing but American flags, red, white and blue ribbons, yellow ribbons, balloons, black and blue bands, and the signs. Oh God, the signs. Just THINKING about them is killing me. So much support, sadness, love, grief and respect on these signs. You couldn’t escape them even if you wanted to. It was bad enough on a good day. Wednesday was easily the worst day of the mourning period. As I was driving home, I could see the cops lined up outside the funeral home, waiting to pay their respects. It was heartbreaking to see them all. I’m glad that I missed the funeral procession on Thursday - again, it was hard enough driving past the funeral home where the cops had already begun to gather.

If anything, watching the seacoast pull together to mourn this man, also drove home the idea of family. Many of us didn’t know him personally, but we pulled together to celebrate his memory, to respect a man who died protecting his fellow officers. That’s some pretty impressive stuff. For a fleeting moment, I felt so connected to my neighbors that it made me feel like I was back in Jeff’s house, watching L try to eat Cherrios by himself and stopping him from spilling milk all over himself.

We find family where we least expect it - in the cheek rubbing kiss of a toddler or even in a community mourning one of their own.